Police arrest five more bike gang members in continuing crackdown
Five members of rival outlaw motorcycle gangs operating in Fort McMurray have been arrested.
Police have released few other details about the execution of four search warrants Wednesday with a news conference scheduled for Monday.
The arrests come as a result of a joint investigation by Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams and RCMP Wood Buffalo in relation to an ongoing conflict between the Fort McMurray chapters of the Warlocks Motorcycle Club and the Syndicate, a Hells Angels support club.
These charges are just the latest attempt by authorities to disrupt the activities of motorcycle gangs in the province.
The Hells Angels had largely gone unchallenged in the province since arriving in 1997 and the Warlocks have been on police radar since 2005, but didn’t officially establish their first Canadian chapter until November 2010 in Alberta.
On April 23, 2014 police laid the first organized crime charges against Hells Angels members in Alberta after executing search warrants in Edmonton, Acheson, Strathcona County and Leduc.
Investigators seized a large banner from the Hells Angels Westridge chapter clubhouse, 19 Hells Angels’ vests, a book of motorcycle club world rules, and rings, belt buckles and necklaces with the death head insignia.
Police also seized 12 kilograms of marijuana and two handguns
Around the same time, four members of the Warlocks and four associates were later arrested after a raid on a home in Drayton Valley, where investigators seized a loaded handgun, six rifles, 273 rounds of ammunition, one kilogram of marijuana, 200 prescription pills and more than $6,000 in cash.